Glenoid loosening, still a main complication in shoulder arthroplasty, could be related to glenohumeral orientation and conformity, cementing techniques, fixation design and periprosthetic bone quality [1,2]. While past numerical analyses were conducted to understand the relative role of these factors, so far none used realistic representations of bone microstructure, which has an impact on structural bone properties [3]. This study aims at using refined microFE models including accurate cortical bone geometry and internal porosity, to evaluate the effects of fixation design, glenohumeral conformity, and bone quality on internal bone tissue and cement stresses under physiological and pathological loads. Four cadaveric scapulae were scanned at 82µm resolution with a high resolution peripheral quantitative computer tomography (XtremeCT Scanco). Images were processed and virtually implantated with two anatomical glenoid replacements (UHMWPE Keeled and Pegged designs, Exactech). These images were converted to microFE models consisting of nearly 43 million elements, with detailed geometries of compact and trabecular bone, implant, and a thin layer of penetrating cement through the porous bone. Bone tissue, implant and cement layer were assigned material properties based on literature. These models were loaded with a central load at the glenohumeral surface, with the opposite bone surface fully constrained. Effects of glenohumeral conformity were simulated with increases of the applied load area from 5mm-radius to a fully conformed case with the entire glenoid surface loaded. The models were additionally subjected to a superiorly shifted load mimicking torn rotator cuff conditions. These models were solved and compared for internal stresses within the structures (Figure 1) with a parallel solver (parFE, ETH Zurich) on a computation cluster, and peak stresses in each region compared by design and related to apparent bone density.Introduction
Methods
